Excerpt: With terrorist attacks becoming par for the course these days, here’s why you should check if your Travel Insurance covers terrorist attacks as well.

While you’re researching and making a note of the activities that you want to do on your trip abroad, it is not unwise to also factor in the possibility of a terrorist attack, especially if you’re travelling to places in the Middle East or areas bordering war zones.

Since terror attacks can happen anywhere nowadays, even your best planned holiday can get impacted by terror-related incidents, which can lead to flight delays, cancelled bookings, loss of possessions and even injury or loss of life.

While most insurance policies classify events arising from terrorism among their exemptions, each insurance policy differs from the other in terms of what they cover. So, it’s always a good idea to read the fine print and check what you’re covered for.

Statistically speaking, the chances of your travel being impacted by a terrorist attack are pretty low. But in the off chance that it does happen, here are some measures you can take to reduce its impact on your vacation:

Check If Your Travel Insurance Covers Terrorism:

If you anticipate that the place you’ll be travelling to is vulnerable to terrorist attacks, one of the first things you should do is check if the Travel Insurance you’ve purchased includes terrorist attacks in its cover.

Some Travel Insurance policies are known to offer cover for various scenarios arising from acts of terror. For instance, a situation in which a terror attack takes place at your destination within 30 days of your arrival.

If You Need To Cancel Your Hotel Bookings:

If your vacation destination is hit by a terrorist attack out of the blue, you may have to abruptly cut short your holiday. This means cancelling your hotel bookings and rebooking your flights. If you’ve made your hotel booking through merchants like MakeMyTrip, Expedia, Agoda etc., you’ll need to check if they’re offering you a refund on your cancelled booking owing to terrorist acts. If you don’t get a refund, check if your Travel Insurance plan can offer you compensation to offset your financial losses.

Some Travel Insurance plans even offer emergency assistance services. This will prove useful as you will be able to access a host of services like a referral to medical services, interpreters, embassies, legal assistance etc. through a dedicated hotline. In fact, even Credit Card issuers have a 24-hour hotline and they offer 24×7 concierge services.

These can be particularly useful if you need to move to a different hotel or take the next flight out of the country. They might also be able to offer the same services as mentioned above.

What If You Anticipate A Terror Attack?

Let’s assume that you come to know about a couple of stray terror incidents occurring in the country you’re travelling to a couple of weeks before your scheduled trip, which leads the state department to issue a travel alert urging caution.

If you’re mulling calling off the trip and rescheduling it for later, you should know that your Travel Insurance plan will not cover your trip cancellation because of an imminent threat of a terror attack. Since the incident has not occurred yet, the fear of the threat of a terror attack is not enough reason for your trip cancellation.

Does Travel Insurance Cover Riots Or Other Violence:

You’ve arrived in Paris for your annual vacation when suddenly a riot breaks out which causes a clash between the police and protestors. You decide to not take chances and go back to your hotel room and plan for your trip cancellation. Will Travel Insurance cover your trip cancellation because of the riot?

Most likely not since civil unrest, protest, rioting or acts of war don’t fall under terrorist acts. Sometimes, a small protest can escalate to a full-blown skirmish which might lead aeroplane carriers or tour operators to cancel all services. In this case, your Travel Insurance provider might offer you compensation for trip cancellation.

What If Terror Strikes In The Middle Of Your Vacation?

You decide to go ahead with your travel plans anyway, but get caught in a terror attack. In such a case, you need to check if your Credit Card Travel Insurance plan, Life Insurance plan, or standalone Travel Insurance plan provide the following coverage:

Death, total and permanent disability:

This benefit will come into play in the case of death or severe injury leading to total and permanent disability. This is designed to replace lost earnings, or prevent the disruption of future livelihood of the insured and their dependents.

Emergency medical treatment:

This will cover for hospital fees and emergency services like ambulance, emergency stabilisation, treatment etc.

Emergency evacuation and repatriation of remains:

This covers costs incurred on emergency and medical evacuation back to your home country, or in the case of death, professional services to transport mortal remains for proper cremation or burial.

There are a lot of other benefits and facilities that Insurance providers offer so you’ll need to check them carefully and read the fine print to know what might prove useful in the event of a sudden terror attack.

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About Saroni Chakravarti

Saroni loves all things quaint and old world- be it art, music or cinema. She has a special knack for spotting the weirdest traits in people and can't for the life of her understand why she attracts the worst co-passengers. Despite her cynical exterior, she still hopes for a world that will be free from discrimination and cruelty. When she's not spending her day commuting, she can be found watching funny videos, reading, and sending out needy vibes to strays around her.